Action against guess papers, tuition centres in Punjab

Govt keen to ban guess papers, tuition centres
Lahore, Sep 02: The Punjab government is seeking help of the Law Department
and Intelligence agencies to take action against publishers of guide
books, guess papers and runners of tuition centres in the province,
sources in the Education Department said here Tuesday.

They revealed
that a meeting in this regard was held at the Punjab Civil Secretariat
on Saturday last, which was headed by Rana Muhammad Afzal, chairman
committee on guide books and guess papers. The committee was formed by
Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif. The meeting was attended by
Secretary Law, Secretary Higher Education and Secretary Schools, DIG
Special Branch, Chairman Textbook Board, principal of certain colleges
and schools, all the stake-holders including President Urdu Bazaar,
owners of tuition centres and two publishers of guess papers and guide
books.

The sources disclosed that all the stakeholders had assured
the committee members their cooperation for banning the publication of
such material. An official of the Education Department said that there
were eleven publishers of guide books and five of guess papers, who
maintain that "it is a big business as every year around 2.2 million
students of matriculation and 1.2 million of Intermediate get help from
such help books."

When contacted Rana M Afzal said that the
stake-holders were aware of the dire results of such publications and
they had pledged to help the committee in this regard.

He said that the publication of key books, guess papers and guides was
not only harming the quality of education, but the publishers were also
breaking into the examination system, to make their guess papers more
and more invincible. Regarding tuition centres, Rana said, "The owners
of academies believe that parents do not want their children waste
time, as the schools did not remain open throughout the year, thus they
send them to tuition centres."

"They also advocate that teachers
belong to a low paid community and they cannot earn their bread
depending only upon their salaries," he said and added, "They have also
maintained that learning more and more is the basic right of a
student." The matter would be examined thoroughly and it would take time, Rana concluded. The nation

0.15m get admission in polytechnic institutes
Lahore: About 0.15 million students, the highest after Intermediate
groups in general education, opted for admission in the Polytechnic
Institutes and Colleges of Technology in the Punjab province this year.

The
students with less merit who do not get admission in the colleges get
admission in the polytechnic institutes where the merit ranged from 500
marks to 600.

The most popular is the three-year Diploma of Associate Engineer (DAE) in Mechanical, Electrical and Civil Engineering.

The parents from less privileged class prefer to send their children for these courses in Polytechnics.

The
C.Com and D.Com in Polytechnic Institutes equal to Intermediate are
also popular among the students who wanted to do their B.Com-IT and
M.Com.

All these examinations are conducted by the Punjab Board of Technical Education (PBTE).

The admissions in Polytechnic Institutes ended on August 31st where classes too will start from September 1 (today).

According
to an estimate some one lakh children were admitted in 200 Polytechnic
Institutes and 40 Colleges of Technology in the Province and Azad
Kashmir, majority of them enrolled in DAE. The merit this year was high
and the administration had to admit majority students in second shift.

As
many as 50,000 students were admitted in C.Com and D.Com equivalent to
Intermediate in commerce group at the Polytechnic Institutes and some
25,000 in B.Tech. As many as 10,000 students were admitted in other
technical and vocational courses of six months to one year duration.

This is in addition to the students admitted in TEVTA institutions whose examination is conducted by TEVTA itself.

Some
of the private institutions offering C.Com and D.Com have obtained
affiliation from the Multan Board and universities other than the
Punjab University for their graduate programmes. A well number of
students took admission in computer courses ACCA, CAT, CFA, CIMA etc

The
admission trend reflect the desire of Pakistani youth to acquire higher
education despite the inflated fee and hard hitting economic
conditions. Meanwhile, a fair number of Matriculates desire to search
jobs in govt and non-govt organisations, Army, Air force and police
establishment according to their eligibility. The nation

Malpractices in education dept: MPA
Lahore: Member of Punjab Assembly Zobia Rubab Malik
has demanded that the Punjab Chief Minister take strict notice of the
malpractices in the Higher Education Department.

The MPA
submitted a resolution in the Punjab Assembly Secretariat on Tuesday
after a news item was published, stating that appointments
had been made in the Higher Education Department without considering
the merit policy of the government.

She said the junior
officers had been appointed whereas senior and more experienced
officers were awaiting appointments either in the center or in other
provinces.

This, Zobia said, was leaving a negative impact on
the performance of the department and, at the same time, it was
discouraging for the senior officers who had been waiting for
appointments for some time now.

The MPA further demanded that
a probe team be set up and said that the CM must explain the whole
incident to the Punjab Assembly. The news

TEVTA clarifies news item
Lahore: Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority (TEVTA)
has denied the contents of a news item published in a section of the
press regarding end of age relaxation to get admission in three years
DAE Course in TEVTA Polytechnic Institute. A spokesman of TEVTA in a
press release said that the Authority of TEVTA has framed a policy
regarding relaxation of age.

According to this policy, the age limit
for admission in D.A.E. will be upto 18 years while Principal of
concerned Polytechnic institute can relax the age for one year, he
added. Similarly, the age relaxation for students to get admission in
three years D.A.E course in Polytechnic Institute against 5% quota of
Government Technical Training Institute and Hafiz-e-Quran will be for
three years. By this initiative, thousands of students will avail the
opportunity to get admission in D.A.E. course of Polytechnic Institute,
the spokesman said. App